1. Field of the Invention
This invention pertains in general to computer system administration, and more specifically, to facilitation of installation of an application to other clients in an enterprise using a distribution server.
2. Description of Related Art
Software distribution servers facilitate installation of applications on multiple client systems. Using current software distribution servers, an administrator of an enterprise analyzes an application of a source client system, uploading the application along with any additional required information to the software distribution server. This application data is then stored on the server and used for subsequent installation of the application on a set of target clients within the enterprise.
However, these current software distribution servers require an administrator or other human user expressly to analyze the application in order to provide the application to the software distribution server in the format required by the server. This places on the administrator the burden of viewing, analyzing, and manipulating the application data. This burden increases in proportion to the number of distinct application formats that are supported, since the administrator must then be familiar with many different formats in order to properly analyze and manipulate the application data. The burden is further increased when the operating system of the client on which the application is located is not one with which the administrator is familiar, since the administrator is then even less likely to be familiar with the different application formats supported by that operating system, or to have the necessary expertise with the various system tools used to perform the analysis and manipulation of the application.
As one example, the server operating system could be some version of MICROSOFT WINDOWS, but the enterprise could have a number of APPLE MAC OS X client systems, which support application package formats such as .app, .pkg, .mpkg, and .dmg. An administrator familiar with WINDOWS but not with MACINTOSH systems would thus be unlikely to be familiar with the different possible tools and commands used to analyze and manipulate the applications, much less the details of the various package formats.